Recently LRC published an intriguing article, From Ike With Love: The Age of Deception (1952-2016), by Mark Sunwall. The author believes that in light of the hysterical 24/7 mainstream media/deep state driven obsession that the present president is a captive tool of the evil and nefarious Putin and the Russians, perhaps it is time for a reevaluation of Robert Welch’s controversial book, The Politician, on Dwight Eisenhower, which asserted that Ike was not all what he appeared to the general public.
Especially note the specific excerpt from Welch below dealing with CIA director Allen Welch Dulles. I have long believed that it is this explicit passage that warranted the severe and deliberate sustained attack upon Welch by “CIA conservatives” William F. Buckley Jr. and James Burnham and their publishing vehicle, the National Review. The orthodox Buckleyites have a different spin on this tale and why WFB was a gatekeeper.
By speaking truth to power, Robert Welch dared impugn the character and stature of Dulles and the Central Intelligence Agency for which Buckley and Burnham had served (and continued to faithfully covertly serve):
“Allen Dulles is the most protected and untouchable supporter of Communism, next to Eisenhower himself, in Washington.”
He was therefore declared anathema. Welch and his John Birch Society must be purged and excommunicated from the ranks of “respectable conservatives.” The Communist Party of the United States of America (CPUSA) and its fronts and fellow travelers later picked up on this meme demonizing Welch and the JBS.
(Especially note and compare the discussion in this previous LRC blog of mine regarding Irving Brown and the CIA secretly aiding the non-Stalinist left relevant to Welch’s excerpt below. Crucial elements of this Trotskyist “non-Stalinist left” morphed into the foundational leadership of today’s neoconservatives, the virulent #NEVERTRUMP enemies of the present president at The Weekly Standard, Commentary, and especially National Review).
The Politician, by Robert Welch
Chapter Sixteen: Associates and Appointments
From Pages 133 and 134
Allen W. Dulles (note 434)
Head of the CIA. Brother of John Foster Dulles. (They have a sister in the State Department whose pro-Communist slant is less disguised). (note 435) Law partner of Arthur Dean. (note 436) Allen Dulles is the most protected and untouchable supporter of Communism, next to Eisenhower himself, in Washington.
How many millions of dollars of American taxpayers’ money Allen Dulles has turned over to Walter Reuther’s stooge, Irving Brown, to promote Communism in fact while pretending to fight it (through building up the left-wing labor unions of Europe), nobody will ever know. How many millions he has turned over to David Dubinsky and Jay Lovestone, both admitted Communists but claiming to be anti-Stalinist Communists, on the specious excuse that it is best to fight the Kremlin through such opponents, nobody will ever know. How many millions he has supplied to the NTS, the phony Russian refugee anti-Communist organization, to enable its world-wide branches to wreck real anti-Communist organizations, none of us will ever know. Nobody is allowed by the Eisenhower Administration to get close enough even to ask. When a man as highly regarded and highly placed as Major General Trudeau, Director of Military Intelligence, even began to suggest that the CIA under Allen Dulles was of no help in safeguarding America against Communism, Trudeau found himself quickly removed from office as head of Military Intelligence and sent to routine duty in the Far East. When Senator McCarthy, at the very height of his popularity with the American people, began casting even random glances at the CIA, his days were immediately numbered.
When a patriotic young American goes into intelligence work, especially against as ruthless an enemy as the Communists, he knows that he is risking his life. He knows that he must count on his own courage, skill, and resourcefulness. But he has every right to expect loyalty to America on the part of those above him in his own agency. One month before that shuttlecock defector, Otto John, went over to the East German Communists, however, he spent a whole day in Allen Dulles’ headquarters in Washington. Then, immediately after John’s defection, our agents in Central Europe began losing their lives.
The inside report is that more than 160 were exposed and killed within the next several weeks. The inference that Otto John took with him from Washington the information that made this possible is clear. Of course there is no way to prove it. McCarthy, if he had been given the full power of the United States Senate behind his investigation, might have been able to uncover the whole rotten story, and to show that the CIA is the most Communist-infested of all the agencies of our government. But Eisenhower was able instead to turn the power of the U. S. Senate onto the destruction of McCarthy. And Allen Dulles still goes his slippery way.